The Heard Center for the Arts was originally built to serve as the home for one of McKinney’s most prominent families. Now, it may be home to some spooky ghosts.
MCKINNEY, Texas — This time of year, the most notable thing about the Heard Craig Center for the Arts isn’t that one of McKinney’s most prominent families once lived here.
“All of them died here,” said executive director Karen Zupanic.
At least seven family members died or were eulogized in the home and although Zupanic never knew them, she has met them many times.
“If it was only one thing, you could write it off as I’m crazy, but it’s more than one thing,” Zupanic laughed.
It’s also more than one person.
Linda Bonner, the center’s former events and membership manager, remembers a wedding where a bride and groom were taking pictures on the staircase. Their photographer asked to take a few pictures without the little boy.
“And they’re just looking around and they said, ‘What little boy?’” Bonner recalled. “And he said, ‘That little boy.’ No one saw him.”
Bonner didn’t need to see him to know it was Stephen Heard, the son of the home’s original owner. Heard died when he was just eight, and returns regularly.
A maintenance worker, doing work in the dining room, once spotted him.
“He said, ‘There is a little boy here and the little boy is going in and out of these chairs,’” Zupanic remembered.
Then a woman attending a luncheon suddenly, and unexplainably, backed her chair away from the table.
“And when asked why she was moving her chair back, it’s because she said a little boy was here and that little boy wanted to sit on her lap,” Zupanic said. “And of course, everyone else at the table could not see a little boy and had no idea what she was talking about.”
One thing everyone can see is the china cabinet. Quite regularly, dishes inside are noticeably rearranged.
“This cup is tipped out,” Bonner pointed out.
There’s just one problem.
“We don’t have any way to open these doors,” Bonner said. “And we haven’t.”
They don’t even have the key to unlock the cabinet’s doors.
It was outside another door, however, that Bonner stopped in her tracks.
“There was this strong smell of smoke and old lady perfume,” she said.
In her older years, Dale Heard, little Stephen’s sister, was known to be a heavy smoker.
But it’s not just smells.
“We looked at each other and said, ‘Did you hear that?’” Zupanic said.
Down in the basement, there’s a door. It’s a door no one uses and a door that, at the time, had five locks and an alarm.
“We heard the door open and close with no alarm going off and none of the five locks were turned,” Zupanic said.
When they went downstairs to check, they didn’t see anything or anyone.
It’s enough to turn these former skeptics into believers and finally answer the question.
“Am I nuts?” Zupanic laughed. “Am I crazy?”
The answer is a resounding … maybe not?